Having looked around a bit I made quite an update to my cube, it went from 375 to 400 cards.
I've mainly added more lands and a few cards of each color, now the multicolor card ratio is at a nice 10%, which seems to be better.
Additionally I've made changes to push archetypes a bit more, while trying to keep parasitic cards down. I think the only 'real' parasitic card left is Intangible Virtue, but there's plenty of token generators to justify its spot in the cube.
Cards I consider replacing - Feedback on these very welcome:
Dread Return > Reanimate; I don't have a copy currently, though I'm slightly concerned it might be too powerful.
Steppe Lynx > ???; Since I don't have a landfall theme there's probably a better one drop for this.
Cliffhaven Vampire > ???; It helps support the lifegain archetype, which is minor, so it feels a bit overpriced and niche, there are probably better options.
Plated Geopede > ???; Again I don't specifically support landfall, it's a good staple, but I'm sure there's a better card which possibly fits other archetypes better (like spellslinger or sacrifice)
I've been out of the MTG loop for a while, playing other games, working on other things. But recently started looking at it again and changed a few cards in my cube with things that seem good (latest updates are found here).
I would definitely appreciate any feedback you guys can give me either on things to add, things that are horrible and should be removed/replaced by something strictly or perhaps things that are too powerful.
I get the cards, I get the synergy. I just don't think they're very good.
Going GWx and wide with allies, means you will be wanting multiple pieces on the board, but if you look at the list, it's quite mana costly.
Grovetender Druids - 4 drop, if you want the ally trigger you will need 1 extra mana everytime, slowing you down for your wincondition cards - Warcaller and/or Beastmaster.
Retreat to Emeria - 4 drop, does practically nothing the turn you drop it - afterwards it gives you an ally every turn, sure but if you're still in the earlier turns you will be dropping your land before you cast a spell, since you need the mana, which means it won't be triggering the rally trigger of whatever you drop down. e.g. If your turn 4 is Retreat to Emeria and your turn 5 is Tajuru Warcaller, your 1/1 ally most likely entered before Warcaller, so warcaller will trigger only once, your token and warcaller have summoning sickness, but whatever you have on the field still gets pumped so let's say 3x 1/1s become 3/3s?
The turn after that will be huge though, especially if I can cast Unified Front at 3 colors! Well yes, but before that on your opponents turn warcaller is just waiting to be removed with it's 1 thoughness.
What I'm trying to say is, first of all you'd need the right pieces, which in limited means you will need some luck. Secondly going wide and then pumping is slower, slower means you give your opponent more time to answer. You can perhaps be slightly faster if you sac scions for mana, but then you give up part of your army to pump. As allies you don't want too many turns for your opponent to respond, because allies are horrible on your opponents turn (no ally triggers). So the faster you can finish the game the better.
Going GWx wide with allies is possible, as you show, the cards are there. But considering it being fairly slow and just weak on your opponents turns I just don't see it competing with other options, especially if your opponent just removes your key card before you get that big wide pump attack turn.. or perhaps just mass-wipes your 1/1 scions/plants (and even Warcaller) with something like Boiling Earth.
It just seems like a lot of effort, but if you do manage to pull it of, kudos to you!
So you looked at the allies to, I'm asuming, see in which ally decks Unified Front and Retreat to Emeria would fit?
I personally think those two cards don't fit in any of the limited ally decks, they are just not aggressive enough. With allies you want to finish it up quickly and not 'waste' your turns on cards that don't do anything.
I think Unified Front is quite bad, it will give 2x 1/1 for 4 mana in most cases and the double ally trigger really isn't worth it. With the exception of Tajuru Beastmaster and Tajuru Warcaller, the other allies really don't care if you have multiple allies enter the battlefield or just one.
For a 4 drop you'd probably want something more aggressive in an ally deck, I'd much rather drop Munda, Ambush Leader for example.
The problem I have with Retreat to Emeria is that it doesn't do anything when you drop it (asuming you drop it as your 4-drop and don't have any lands left to trigger the landfall immediately). It relies on landfall afterwards and it's fairly slow, whereas you want to be aggressive as allies. Now if you'd use it with a land in hand, so basically as a 5-drop, it basically gives you a 1/1 ally + ally trigger for 5 mana OR all your creatures get +1/+1 for 5 mana, which is just horrible, the latter Tajuru Beastmaster does aswel in addition to being a 5/5 (6/6 with trigger) by itself.
tldr: I wouldn't run those 2 cards in a ally deck, they're most likely too slow, I'd rather just run another ally.
Yes, what this guy said. I am interested in hearing opinions about what may be worth investing in. I know there are not currently many cards in BFZ revealed, but if you were to come in right now with a limted card pool and wanted something kick ass that wasn't going to lose much in rotation, or something that was cheap enough that it didnt matter, what would you buy?
Add me to the list aswel, with a slight adjustment.
I do have some cards from the Khan's blocks and also from Magic Origins, but not that many. I purchased them with other formats in mind, mainly commander and such.
I would like to get into standard and wouldn't mind investing in cards from the Khan's blocks but prefer not to invest into cards from the Theros blocks since those will rotate out. What decktypes would you say can be build from Khan's + Origins that will still be valid when Battle for Zendikar hits the field?
For now we know there will be devoid, ingest, landwalk and Allys. So I'm trying to think of something that works now and would be stronger with those new mechanics or at least not become completely useless. Ofcourse it's difficult since we only know like 6 cards so far, but any tips are much appreciated!
Blue Ninja of the Deep Hours > Whirler Rogue; Ninja was underperforming in our matches, seems too much work for often only 1 card draw, whereas Whirler Rogue will always be good.
Green Pathbreaker Wurm > Skysnare Spider; Pathbreaker often ended up being a vanilla thing or just not that good, Skysnare seems a solid upgrade. Thundering Tanadon > Conclave Naturalists; Thundering was only drafted in green, figured I have enough tramplers in there to swap to Conclave for some good ETB stuff. Vital Splicer > Rhox Maulers; Not sure if it's the right swap, had a lot of 3/3, 4-drops in there figured I could do with a 5 drop 4/4 which turns to 6/6 to curve a bit and get a slightly earlier threat for Green.
Gold Cinder Shade > Blazing Hellhound; Cinder Shade often underperformed, mainly due to a lack of mana. Hellhound really impressed me in limited. I don't have Goblin bombardment so I'm going to try it with Hellhound. Lyev Skyknight > Thunderclap Wyvern; Seems better than Lyev and it's just strong!
Colorless Contagion Clasp > Chief of the Foundry; This is mainly a test, really not sure if Contagion Clasp should be swapped out for this or if it should be another artifact. Chief seems like a decent drop on it's own and if you have a few artifact creatures to support it (or whirler rogue / Thopter engineer) I believe it can do some work... but I will probably need to throw in some more artifact creatures. Trigon of Rage > War Horn; Trigon wasn't drafted much, War Horn seems a fine pick for aggro/weenie decks.
That indeed sounds like a pretty mediocre draft, at rare level anyway.
As you say Gorger is the biggest common but I was comparing it to the bombs which weren't seen much in your draft. Compared to those it obviously has drawbacks, but then again it is at common level. If we compare it to other commons, I'd say I personally prefer Rhox Maulers. Maulers are slightly cheaper and because of trample I feel like they can get renowned quite easily, when renowned they are bigger than Gorger and have trample. One of the biggest downsides of Gorger is that it can 'just' be chump-blocked, even before renown you can't really chump block the Maulers.
In short Gorger is the biggest common creature but it needs something extra before it really does work. Because of that, Gorger, on it's own, is not an MVP in my book.
I wonder what the others drafted. You have no rares in your deck and sideboard and you only mentioned Knight of the White Orchid. Not that rares or mythics are a must in limited, but I'm curious what the rest of the players might have had and what you passed on in pack 2 & pack 3.
Eyeblight Assassin can do some work, especially nice in your case when it can trade up to 3/3's like Bounding Krasis. Though there can also be many times where the -1/-1 doesn't matter much and you do want to drop it down to have a creature on the board, so I think you might've gotten lucky in that regard. Doesn't take away that in your case it's definitely an MVP.
I think your deck might lack a bit on the removal department, or rather, makes it a bit too complicated to get rid of big bombs. If someone would drop Outland Colossus, Sentinel of the Eternal Watch or something similar with 6+ thoughness the only removal you really have is Suppression Bonds and after a tap Swift Reckoning.
Arguably Blightcaster can do some work, especially in combination with Weight of the Underworld, but at 1 copy each in your deck I don't think that would show up as often, considering the Blightcaster would have to be in play first aswel. Oh and how could I forget, Fetid Imp, that can do some work if you have a swamp up.
If you can finish things up early (before the big bombs hit the field) and draw your removal at the right times then I suppose it works fine. But if, for example, you use your Suppression Bonds on a 3/1 like Deadbridge Shaman and then a Skysnare Spider shows up... there's really not that much you can do to answer it without jumping through hoops. You would have to go wide to win that.
However, against a deck that goes wide itself, like a thopter deck, your deck would do wonders with all those -1/-1 and -2/-2 effects.
I think you're correct on most parts, perhaps some shifting around, although that might just be personal preference.
I think Sentinel of the Eternal Watch is a bomb regardless of color, it can be easily splashed aswel. And in my opinion Skysnare Spider can be moved up to the bomb-list aswel, it needs to be dealt with or you will lose.
I may be biased on this next one but Chandra's Ignition did some major work for me at the release draft. It is listed in your removal list, but this card is at bomb-level aswel, it wins games (especially in combination with Might of the Masses. There is just one drawback you need to have a creature with high enough power to support it.
As for traps, I think Honored Hierarch is one of the biggest traps, 90% of the time this will be a 1/1 for 1. "Newer players' might fall for it, all they see is a 1 drop 2/2 vigilance that can give any mana! Other than that, some mythics are clearly made for other formats, like EDH, so those are traps but they should be quite obvious.
I'm interested to know how you guys make your mulligan decisions in limited?
In a limited deck as opposed to constructed decks, there are usually fewer combo pieces, so you can't really 'mulligan for your key components', I'm guessing it's all about trying to get the best curve in hand.
Ofcourse there are the obvious choices (too many lands, too few lands, too high CMC etc.) but what are the turning points you go by?
Sort of like, do you want your hand to at least be able to do something useful (not just dropping lands) for the first 3 turns, and go from there?
Do you ever take a gamble with a mulligan when you're at a turning point where your hand, might be fine depending on your next few drops?
Also do you make different mulligan decisions based on the deck you are facing, i.e. if you know it's an aggro, midrange, control deck?
My favorite Willbreaker combo is Throwing Knife. It always targets, whether you choose to throw it or not!
Didn't know that, is that because it triggers when the creature attacks?
I figured you wouldn't have to pick a target until you decide to sacrifice throwing knife.
For Willbreaker this is great but on it's own I guess it's not as much of a surprise shock then.
As in, regardless of wether you want to sacrifice it or not, your opponent will know beforehand who will get the 2 damage as soon as the creature is assigned as attacker.
With all of those in a lot of cases you can also get results with just one of the cards - which makes them decent picks on their own, the 'combo's' would only be that extra push it needs in specific situations.
But I'm guessing you're looking for more silly things?
I've mainly added more lands and a few cards of each color, now the multicolor card ratio is at a nice 10%, which seems to be better.
Additionally I've made changes to push archetypes a bit more, while trying to keep parasitic cards down. I think the only 'real' parasitic card left is Intangible Virtue, but there's plenty of token generators to justify its spot in the cube.
Cards I consider replacing - Feedback on these very welcome:
Current banlist:
Sol Ring, Grafted Wargear, Skullclamp, Behemoth Sledge & Loxodon Warhammer, Shrine of Loyal Legions, Wall of Denial and Plumeveil.
Most for obvious reasons. Skullclamp I might get back on, but it seems too powerful in token decks. Wall of Denial is like a better Plumeveil and Plumeveil was mainly played because it's good at what it does, but the overall consensus was that it's simply not fun, so I removed it.
It's a
375400 card singleton peasant cube.You can find the cube here
I would definitely appreciate any feedback you guys can give me either on things to add, things that are horrible and should be removed/replaced by something strictly or perhaps things that are too powerful.
Going GWx and wide with allies, means you will be wanting multiple pieces on the board, but if you look at the list, it's quite mana costly.
Grovetender Druids - 4 drop, if you want the ally trigger you will need 1 extra mana everytime, slowing you down for your wincondition cards - Warcaller and/or Beastmaster.
Retreat to Emeria - 4 drop, does practically nothing the turn you drop it - afterwards it gives you an ally every turn, sure but if you're still in the earlier turns you will be dropping your land before you cast a spell, since you need the mana, which means it won't be triggering the rally trigger of whatever you drop down. e.g. If your turn 4 is Retreat to Emeria and your turn 5 is Tajuru Warcaller, your 1/1 ally most likely entered before Warcaller, so warcaller will trigger only once, your token and warcaller have summoning sickness, but whatever you have on the field still gets pumped so let's say 3x 1/1s become 3/3s?
The turn after that will be huge though, especially if I can cast Unified Front at 3 colors! Well yes, but before that on your opponents turn warcaller is just waiting to be removed with it's 1 thoughness.
What I'm trying to say is, first of all you'd need the right pieces, which in limited means you will need some luck. Secondly going wide and then pumping is slower, slower means you give your opponent more time to answer. You can perhaps be slightly faster if you sac scions for mana, but then you give up part of your army to pump. As allies you don't want too many turns for your opponent to respond, because allies are horrible on your opponents turn (no ally triggers). So the faster you can finish the game the better.
Going GWx wide with allies is possible, as you show, the cards are there. But considering it being fairly slow and just weak on your opponents turns I just don't see it competing with other options, especially if your opponent just removes your key card before you get that big wide pump attack turn.. or perhaps just mass-wipes your 1/1 scions/plants (and even Warcaller) with something like Boiling Earth.
It just seems like a lot of effort, but if you do manage to pull it of, kudos to you!
I personally think those two cards don't fit in any of the limited ally decks, they are just not aggressive enough. With allies you want to finish it up quickly and not 'waste' your turns on cards that don't do anything.
I think Unified Front is quite bad, it will give 2x 1/1 for 4 mana in most cases and the double ally trigger really isn't worth it. With the exception of Tajuru Beastmaster and Tajuru Warcaller, the other allies really don't care if you have multiple allies enter the battlefield or just one.
For a 4 drop you'd probably want something more aggressive in an ally deck, I'd much rather drop Munda, Ambush Leader for example.
The problem I have with Retreat to Emeria is that it doesn't do anything when you drop it (asuming you drop it as your 4-drop and don't have any lands left to trigger the landfall immediately). It relies on landfall afterwards and it's fairly slow, whereas you want to be aggressive as allies. Now if you'd use it with a land in hand, so basically as a 5-drop, it basically gives you a 1/1 ally + ally trigger for 5 mana OR all your creatures get +1/+1 for 5 mana, which is just horrible, the latter Tajuru Beastmaster does aswel in addition to being a 5/5 (6/6 with trigger) by itself.
tldr: I wouldn't run those 2 cards in a ally deck, they're most likely too slow, I'd rather just run another ally.
Add me to the list aswel, with a slight adjustment.
I do have some cards from the Khan's blocks and also from Magic Origins, but not that many. I purchased them with other formats in mind, mainly commander and such.
I would like to get into standard and wouldn't mind investing in cards from the Khan's blocks but prefer not to invest into cards from the Theros blocks since those will rotate out. What decktypes would you say can be build from Khan's + Origins that will still be valid when Battle for Zendikar hits the field?
For now we know there will be devoid, ingest, landwalk and Allys. So I'm trying to think of something that works now and would be stronger with those new mechanics or at least not become completely useless. Ofcourse it's difficult since we only know like 6 cards so far, but any tips are much appreciated!
Out of curiosity is Bond of Agony not in it due to the 'fun' factor.
Below the changes and some quick comments on them.
What do you guys think?
Do you agree, or do you find some changes just outright stupid? Let me know!
White
Triclopean Sight > Path to Exile; Got a Path promo had to put it in there. Ddin't like Triclopean that much.
Syndic of Tithes > Sentinel of the Eternal Watch; Syndic didn't do that much in most games really want Sentinel in there.
Ronom Unicorn > Topan Freeblade; Already have Kami of Ancient Law and Topan is good!
Knight of Meadowgrain > Consul's Lieutenant; Seems better, replaced it with KoM to prevent a lot of double white mana costs.
Blue
Ninja of the Deep Hours > Whirler Rogue; Ninja was underperforming in our matches, seems too much work for often only 1 card draw, whereas Whirler Rogue will always be good.
Red
Skitter of Lizards > Goblin Glory Chaser; Skitter ended up being a 1/1 or 2/2 most of the time not too impressive, going to try Glory chaser, if it overlaps too much with Reckless Waif I'm going to try something else.
Battle-Rattle Shaman > Thopter Engineer; a 3-drop fix really and I loved it in limited origins
Deathforge Shaman > Seismic Elemental; I feel like this will impact the game more than Deathforge Shaman
Grenzo's Cutthroat > Boggart Brute; Just seems better and fills the red 3-drops a bit
Green
Pathbreaker Wurm > Skysnare Spider; Pathbreaker often ended up being a vanilla thing or just not that good, Skysnare seems a solid upgrade.
Thundering Tanadon > Conclave Naturalists; Thundering was only drafted in green, figured I have enough tramplers in there to swap to Conclave for some good ETB stuff.
Vital Splicer > Rhox Maulers; Not sure if it's the right swap, had a lot of 3/3, 4-drops in there figured I could do with a 5 drop 4/4 which turns to 6/6 to curve a bit and get a slightly earlier threat for Green.
Gold
Cinder Shade > Blazing Hellhound; Cinder Shade often underperformed, mainly due to a lack of mana. Hellhound really impressed me in limited. I don't have Goblin bombardment so I'm going to try it with Hellhound.
Lyev Skyknight > Thunderclap Wyvern; Seems better than Lyev and it's just strong!
Colorless
Contagion Clasp > Chief of the Foundry; This is mainly a test, really not sure if Contagion Clasp should be swapped out for this or if it should be another artifact. Chief seems like a decent drop on it's own and if you have a few artifact creatures to support it (or whirler rogue / Thopter engineer) I believe it can do some work... but I will probably need to throw in some more artifact creatures.
Trigon of Rage > War Horn; Trigon wasn't drafted much, War Horn seems a fine pick for aggro/weenie decks.
As you say Gorger is the biggest common but I was comparing it to the bombs which weren't seen much in your draft. Compared to those it obviously has drawbacks, but then again it is at common level. If we compare it to other commons, I'd say I personally prefer Rhox Maulers. Maulers are slightly cheaper and because of trample I feel like they can get renowned quite easily, when renowned they are bigger than Gorger and have trample. One of the biggest downsides of Gorger is that it can 'just' be chump-blocked, even before renown you can't really chump block the Maulers.
In short Gorger is the biggest common creature but it needs something extra before it really does work. Because of that, Gorger, on it's own, is not an MVP in my book.
At common level for Green I would pick these over Gorger: Rhox Maulers, Pharika's Disciple and Orchard Spirit. And some others aswel.
If we're talking pure 'big' creatures, I would most likely rather have 2x Rhox Maulers as opposed to a Gorger and a Maulers.
Eyeblight Assassin can do some work, especially nice in your case when it can trade up to 3/3's like Bounding Krasis. Though there can also be many times where the -1/-1 doesn't matter much and you do want to drop it down to have a creature on the board, so I think you might've gotten lucky in that regard. Doesn't take away that in your case it's definitely an MVP.
Gold-Forged Sentinel and Vastwood Gorger. Both do what they must do, they're relatively big creatures and most likely need to be dealt with. But they're not exactly best picks in the set, which makes me wonder where the 'better' bombs were in the draft. Since cards like Skysnare Spider, Gaea's Revenge, Outland Colossus, Sentinel of the Eternal Watch and Kothophed, Soul Hoarder are like those two but simply better. Weren't any of those in the draft?
I think your deck might lack a bit on the removal department, or rather, makes it a bit too complicated to get rid of big bombs. If someone would drop Outland Colossus, Sentinel of the Eternal Watch or something similar with 6+ thoughness the only removal you really have is Suppression Bonds and after a tap Swift Reckoning.
Arguably Blightcaster can do some work, especially in combination with Weight of the Underworld, but at 1 copy each in your deck I don't think that would show up as often, considering the Blightcaster would have to be in play first aswel. Oh and how could I forget, Fetid Imp, that can do some work if you have a swamp up.
If you can finish things up early (before the big bombs hit the field) and draw your removal at the right times then I suppose it works fine. But if, for example, you use your Suppression Bonds on a 3/1 like Deadbridge Shaman and then a Skysnare Spider shows up... there's really not that much you can do to answer it without jumping through hoops. You would have to go wide to win that.
However, against a deck that goes wide itself, like a thopter deck, your deck would do wonders with all those -1/-1 and -2/-2 effects.
Any chance of posting your sideboard?
I think you're correct on most parts, perhaps some shifting around, although that might just be personal preference.
I think Sentinel of the Eternal Watch is a bomb regardless of color, it can be easily splashed aswel. And in my opinion Skysnare Spider can be moved up to the bomb-list aswel, it needs to be dealt with or you will lose.
I may be biased on this next one but Chandra's Ignition did some major work for me at the release draft. It is listed in your removal list, but this card is at bomb-level aswel, it wins games (especially in combination with Might of the Masses. There is just one drawback you need to have a creature with high enough power to support it.
As for traps, I think Honored Hierarch is one of the biggest traps, 90% of the time this will be a 1/1 for 1. "Newer players' might fall for it, all they see is a 1 drop 2/2 vigilance that can give any mana! Other than that, some mythics are clearly made for other formats, like EDH, so those are traps but they should be quite obvious.
In a limited deck as opposed to constructed decks, there are usually fewer combo pieces, so you can't really 'mulligan for your key components', I'm guessing it's all about trying to get the best curve in hand.
Ofcourse there are the obvious choices (too many lands, too few lands, too high CMC etc.) but what are the turning points you go by?
Sort of like, do you want your hand to at least be able to do something useful (not just dropping lands) for the first 3 turns, and go from there?
Do you ever take a gamble with a mulligan when you're at a turning point where your hand, might be fine depending on your next few drops?
Also do you make different mulligan decisions based on the deck you are facing, i.e. if you know it's an aggro, midrange, control deck?
I'd like to hear your thoughts, thanks!
Didn't know that, is that because it triggers when the creature attacks?
I figured you wouldn't have to pick a target until you decide to sacrifice throwing knife.
For Willbreaker this is great but on it's own I guess it's not as much of a surprise shock then.
As in, regardless of wether you want to sacrifice it or not, your opponent will know beforehand who will get the 2 damage as soon as the creature is assigned as attacker.
Things like:
Pharika's Disciple + Wild Instincts = deathtouch fight
Turn to Frog + Eyeblight Assassin = turn to 1/1 give -1/-1
Act of Treason + Nantuko Husk or Blazing Hellhound = steal it, use it, sac it.
Send to Sleep (or other tap effect) + Swift Reckoning = tap it, kill it.
With all of those in a lot of cases you can also get results with just one of the cards - which makes them decent picks on their own, the 'combo's' would only be that extra push it needs in specific situations.
But I'm guessing you're looking for more silly things?